The Chinese Compass or Lo Pan

The magnetic alignment of properties and places plays an important part in a traditional Feng Shui evaluation, and is often known as the Compass School. The Chinese compass or lo pan is the tool that is used to evaluate direction.

Heaven and Earth

The lo pan is square in shape, representing the finite and measurable qualities of the earth, while the circle in the middle represents the infinite an immeasurable properties of the heavens. The middle circle is known as heavens pool; it holds a very sensitive and finely balanced magnetic needle.

More than just magnetism

A lo pan reading is in essence a reading of the combination of the three energies; the Feng Shui specialist is the human link between the heavens and the earth. It is the combined interaction of heaven, human and earth chi together with that of the property that generate the final reading.

The Compass School of Feng Shui

In its simplest form, the compass evaluation divides the environment into eight direction; North, South, South West and so on. From the eight directions come the trigrams, that can carry all kinds of information. From the eight directions also come the ba chop (eight mansions), ba gua (eight trigrams) and flying star methods.

The next layer divides the circle into 24 directions known as mountains. Going even deeper, you get to the 64 directions governed by hexagrams (two trigrams stacked together). If you wish to keep going, you can split the 64 directions into smaller slices.

Lo Pan styles

There are many different styles of Lo Pan throughout the world, designed to reflect the particular methods of the user. This picture shows a slice of the Lo Pan that Mike uses during his Feng Shui consultations.

The Rings

As you move out from the centre, you see many different rings; each ring or set of rings represents a different method of interpretation. The first ring shows the trigrams of the early heaven sequence. The divisions tend to get smaller and smaller as you get towards the edge of the compass, indicating the precision with which readings are taken.

The Lo Pan in use

During a Feng Shui consultation, Mike takes the information from a combination of locations through a property, using a selection of rings from the Lo Pan. The resultant information helps to paint the Feng Shui picture of how Chi is working in that place.